Thread by @UnaHajdari

There isn’t a conflict or escalation brewing in Kosovo atm. Kosovo Serbs set up roadblocks towards two main border crossings with Serbia in the north, in opposition to a move by the 🇽🇰 gov’t whereby Serbian citizens need special certificates when entering the country. #calmdown

https://twitter.com/goncharenkoua/status/1553798565037805568

Since Serbia doesn’t recognize Kosovo, 🇽🇰 citizens need special “temporary documents” while residing in the country. PM Albin Kurti recently announced that Kosovo would reciprocate by demanding the same from Serbian citizens. The decision enters into force tonight.

Politically motivated (or influenced) Kosovo Serbs gathered on the roads towards the border in order to stop people from driving to Serbia. Similar roadblocks have been set up several times over the years, and while they do signal tensions, they rarely lead to armed escalations.

This is because the north of Kosovo is covered by more NATO/KFOR troops per capita than almost any place in Europe. They are stationed there to maintain order, and escalations like these are exactly when their powers come into force.

Of course, this comes on the back of a month-long spat between Kosovo and Serbia over how that border in particular (which Serbia considers an internal, administrative border) should be handled. I wrote about the last time things got intense last year: politico.eu/article/von-de…

Ever since Kurti was elected PM, he has tried to solidify Kosovo’s independence by doing to Serbia what Serbia has done to Kosovo — as in, if you don’t think we’re independent, watch us exercise our powers on our territory.

For Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, this hurts his pride and he’ll try to save face by making inflammatory statements like the one below to deflect from the fact that his hands are basically tied. rts.rs/page/stories/c…

There have been sirens going off in North Mitrovica, the main Serb-majority municipality in the country, for a good part of the day. They’re intended to go off anytime there’s even a whiff of an incident that could endanger civilians, so that they know to stay off the streets.

But they go off when there are police raids there as well, like they have in the past year or so when the police confiscated illegal goods. While they are definitely unpleasant and startling, the main goal is to make sure civilians aren’t accidentally caught in crossfire or w/e.

The reason Serbia is “upset” is bc Kosovo did this outside the EU-monitored dialogue between the two, intended as the venue for solving outstanding bilateral issues. It messes with the perception President Vucic tries to emulate that he has everything under control.

At this moment (obv subject to change) Kosovo Police confirm that they were shot at while on the ground in the northern part of the country, but that no one has been injured. They also confirm that Kosovo Albanian drivers close to the border crossing were hassled by local Serbs.

While none of this is “normal” or welcome, it sadly isn’t extraordinarily out of proportion to previous incidents in the north. Various political and criminal Kosovo Serb groups flex their muscles when they feel their domination in that area is threatened, and yes, they are armed

The KFOR (NATO troops part of the Kosovo Forces) have active and regularly updated intervention plans on all the main roads leading into Kosovo in the North, which they can implement whenever they deem the situation to have significantly escalated.

https://twitter.com/adriatikk/status/1553813386403667971

While Russia is *always* happy when things go haywire in the Balkans, this incident was entirely tied to a decision by the Kosovo government that was announced ages ago, and the fact that Serbia is unhappy about it.

https://twitter.com/MarkUrban01/status/1553822774539468800

After the 1999 NATO bombing of what remained of Yugoslavia (yes the thing Putin always mentions), Serbia withdrew its military and political presence from Kosovo and signed the Kumanovo Agreement which set up a NATO-enforced air and ground safety zone. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumanovo_…

While various facets of the agreement were suspended at times as a sign of goodwill (and joint NATO and Serbian army patrols were organized along the border) when a security crisis hits they’re immediately reimposed. This basically the equivalent of NATO Article 5 being violated.

As someone who has personally visited Bondsteel (the biggest US army base in the region, found in Kosovo) and the barracks of various NATO members close to the border — I can claim with almost 100% certainty that Russia or Serbia cannot (re)occupy Kosovo overnight.

The only thing this frantic fear-mongering (and spreading of alarmist disinfo) will achieve is that (armed) rabble-rousers will feel encouraged to actually go out and shoot people while the whole world is watching. So have that on your conscience while you spread fake news.

Additional NATO and Kosovo police presence has been placed on the bridges between Serb-majority North Mitrovica and Albanian-majority South Mitrovica, to pre-empt spillover tensions. FYI, the main bridge between the two municipalities has been closed off for almost two decades…

… and is guarded by international forces (such as the Italian Carabinieri) to deter ease of access for people who might want to escalate things. (This is for those suddenly interested in inter-ethnic tensions in Kosovo.)

https://twitter.com/evropaelire/status/1553845267165859841